AN EYE FOR AN EYE Definition & Meaning

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an eye for an eye

The principle of justice that requires punishment equal in kind to the offense (not greater than the offense, as was frequently given in ancient times). Thus, if someone puts out another's eye, one of the offender's eyes should be put out. The principle is stated in the Book of Exodus as “Thou shalt give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.”

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Jesus referred to this principle in the Sermon on the Mount, calling on his followers to turn the other cheek instead.

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Idioms and Phrases

Punishment in which the offender suffers what the victim has suffered, exact retribution, as in Joe believed in an eye for an eye; stealing his client would have to be avenged. This idiom is a quotation from the Bible, which has “Life shall go for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth” (Deuteronomy 19:21); the idea is contradicted in the New Testament (see turn the other cheek).

see eye for an eye.

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Example Sentences

Examples have not been reviewed.

Asked for his favorite Bible verse during the 2016 campaign, Trump mentioned the part of scripture that refers to “an eye for an eye,” an Old Testament instruction for revenge that was rejected by Jesus’s call for humility, forgiveness and love toward enemies.

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How well he understood that vibrant passion of hate, that longing to exact an eye for an eye, an outrage for an outrage!

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I don’t know much about God— not the God they have down there, where they take an eye for an eye an’ a tooth for a tooth and kill because some one else has killed.

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